----- Original Message -----
From: "Daniel Rocha" <danieldiniz at gmail.com>
>> I really don't see the contradiction in giving al-qaeda chemical
> weapons,
> even though they are deadly enemies.
>
Oh, OK, I admit I hadn't considered the view that providing your
nemesis, who wants to destroy you, with chemical weapons might be a
perfectly logical thing to do. In that case I'll try another track.
First, try googling for Saudi backing of Al-Nusra. You will find lots of
unsubstantiated statements, on all the conspiracist sites, and even on
some sensible and pro-revolution sites, stated in their case innocently
out of ignorance. You will find not a single substantiated reference. If
any of the conspiracist sites have a reference, it will be to some
similar site, which likewise only has a bland unsubstantiated statement.
You will find lots of references, however, to the Saudis trying to build
a force in recent months especially to counter Al Nusra and ISIL.
Second, even if we accept the proposition (here I'll put words into
your mouth) that the Saudis may be happy to back Al Qaida against some
other enemy a long way away so that it at least keeps them of their
backs - something which might have some logic, we still need to
understand what a map of the region looks like. Yes, Afghanistan is a
long way away (though even there, the Saudis only ever backed the
Taliban, which has an entirely national Afghan agenda, I know of zero
evidence they backed Al Qaida there), so it might be possible, logically
if not factually. Perhaps Chechnya.
But Syria is separated from Saudi Arabia by only smallish Jordan.
Jordan, like Saudi Arabia, is ruled by a monarchy. Its major opposition
at home is the Muslim Brotherhood, who want to overthrow the monarchy. A
victory of an Islamist-inspired movement in Syria is not what Jordan
wants; and the last thing the Saudis want is a fellow monarchy, right on
their borders, overthrown by Islamists. And these factors are even more
concerning to the Jordanian (and thus the Saudi) monarchies if we are
talking about radical jihadists.
For the record, I see both Saudi Arabia and Al Qaida, despite the
opposing relations with imperialism, as enemies of the Arab revolutions,
from differing angles. It might well suit me to claim that Saudi Arabia
was backing Al Qaida precisely in order to undermine the Syrian
revolution, as part of a drive to make it more Sunni-sectarian. It seems
the Saudis did have that aim earlier in the Syrian uprising, not with Al
Qaida, but with more "national" Salafists, but got their fingers burnt
precisely due to the rise of Al Qaida within this "space" and thus
swapped to their current strategy. The main problem with making this
assertion, however, is that I think our views ought to be based on
reality, not our delusions (the even more delusional "US is backing Al
Qaida in Syria" is too absurd to even bother with).
But at the end of the day, my main point was that this lapse is what
showed me how stupid the tunnel story was.